


He Wouldn't be Pulled into the Chaos

by SuchaPrettyPoison



Series: Swooner [6]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Freeform, Humor, Romance, Swoonerverse, there is some cursing...if that bothers you...just saying, this is SWOONER
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-01-12
Packaged: 2018-09-17 01:41:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9298526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuchaPrettyPoison/pseuds/SuchaPrettyPoison
Summary: He was waxing poetry about the girl who broke into his place and had swiped his wallet.Maybe he needed a psych-eval…“Come on Red Riding Hood, go put on clothes so I don’t have to think about your big bad wolf.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thea is fire. Roy is a killjoy.

What had he done to deserve this?  
What could he have possibly done to piss the universe off so much that it decided that his life wasn’t already enough of an uphill battle?

All he wanted to do was have a lazy Sunday morning, the first he’d had in ages, in his postage stamp size apartment and catch up on shows that he’d missed.  
It was a perfect plan; a dream plan.  
He’d even made himself a bowl of cereal, and by bowl he meant he’d used a pot so he could fit all of the cereal’s contents in at once. He was not about having to go up and down to refill a bowl.  
He needed to get proper kitchen supplies.  
It was on his list.  
To do that he needed money.

This shouldn’t have been a problem. Roy had a decent paying stable on the books job.  
He was a junior undercover; he was making a name for himself. He got his fucking cover blown and detective Queen’s little sister had stolen his damn wallet.  
Not that he could prove that she’d taken it. Hell, it was even difficult for him to wrap his mind around the idea. Thea Queen was a wisp of a girl, with too big eyes, and a smile that would haunt his dreams.

A girl like that, a girl from money and class, should not have been able to play get-away driver so well. She shouldn’t have worn a smile while taking turns on two wheels, or shot him annoyed looks while he cursed at her.

The situation had happened way too fast. 

Roy had grown up in the Glades, which meant he had to grow up fast and hard if he wanted to survive; it was the only life he’d ever known, it was either you were the predator or the prey and he wasn’t ever going to be the prey. He knew the streets, knew the life, did his fair share of shady deals, till one day he wanted better for himself and his city.  
He fucking wanted better. So he became a predator who protected the prey from others like him, caused him a near death experience and a run in with Star City’s finest.  
Detective Queen had come into his life in a storm of blades, bullets and blood. Roy finally knew what he wanted to do.  
His life changed. He was half in the Glades half out, but he would keep hustling till everything was better.

He was the best J.U. on the force and had no clue how his cover was blown. One minute he thought he was going to have the final bit of evidence to make a solid case on a gun ring, the next he was tearing through an alleyway trying to think of the best way out of the cluster fuck. Then he saw detective Queen’s car and was about to thank everything in the universe when he jumped in the passenger seat only to come face to face with the girl who clearly was not the detective.

Who the hell was she? Why was she in detective Queen’s car? How was the car running when there was no key in the ignition?  
Holy shit, they needed to get out of there. Whoever she was he needed to keep her safe.

“Fucking floor it.”

“Excuse me?” She pursed her lips together and gave him a once over as she spoke, “I do not take orders from strange men with no fashion sense.” 

Really, that’s what she chose to say to the man who had jumped in the car?  
He would need to have a talk to her about safety and how she should properly react.  
Not now though. Now she needed to drive or he was going to move her from the seat and take charge of the getting them out of there portion of his day.

“Look girlie, either you fucking drive or we’re both dead.” His voice was raised, rough, and dangerous; he didn’t care; this was a life or death situation.  
And the damn girl looked bored. She was not reacting as any sane person should.

“Save the dramatics for someone else and get out of the car.” How could she be so flippant? Her hands were on him giving burst of pressure which had him tilting toward the door.  
Was she actually trying to push him out of the car? 

Who the fuck was this girl? 

The men rounded the corner with their guns drawn and he had lost any bit of cool he had. The girl seemed to finally grasp the situation and got them the hell out of the gun show. She never once showed an ounce of fear. No, the girl was all poise and elegance, driving like getting away from the fucking gun runners was something she did on the daily.  
Her shoulder length hair was tucked behind her ears giving him a clear view of her profile and the smile she wore kicked him in the gut.  
She was stunning.  
Fuck.

“This is so much fun!”

He was mentally questioning her sanity - and his own.  
This was not the time to be eyeing some girl. He needed to get the hell out of dodge and away from her. The universe then decided to give him a break for once, because red and blue lights were flashing behind them, and she was pulling the car over, with a bright smile and big innocent eyes she turned the full focus of her charm at officer. Then she gave information that completely floored Roy, because it seemed like the universe decided that it wasn’t giving him a break so much so as laughing at his luck.

Thea Queen, as in detective Oliver Queen’s little sister; the detective who Roy looked up to as his mentor. Holy fuck, Queen was going to kill him for putting her in this situation.  
It took Roy a moment to realize that the officer had left and that Thea was now looking at him with a slightly self-righteous expression. He fought the desire to bang his head against the dashboard in hopes of waking him up from this nightmare, because it had to be all in his head – it just had to be.

“Just saying, you could say thank you for me not ratting you out.”

“What?” his head was spinning. This was turning into even more of a fucking mess. A cluster fuck of such epic proportions that he wondered if they would bench him at the station. She pulled the car back on the road doing the speed limit with that natural poised elegance he figured either she was born with it or she’d been polished since birth. Most likely it was a combo.  
Thea Queen was untouchable in Star City and now he understood why.

“You know, that lovely officer that reminded me not to do 50 down a 35 road. I totally didn’t give you up as a weirdo who jumped in my car.” 

Which begged the question, why hadn’t she given him up?  
Why wasn’t this girl hysterical that a strange man jumped in her car and told her to drive away from men who were intent on shooting them?  
Nothing about her was what he expected - or normal for that matter.

“You don’t have keys in the ignition. You sure this is your car?” Roy knew it was Oliver’s car. He’d been in the car several times and he knew the plates.

“Some cars don’t need keys.” 

True, but not true for this car. He was beginning to get a headache and grounded out, “This isn’t one of those cars,” while refusing to rub his temple because he wasn’t going to show any sign of weakness. Weakness got you killed. 

He needed to get to the station. He was going to be drowning in paperwork thanks to this little cluster and he needed to talk to Oliver. 

“It could be. You don’t know everything Little Red Riding Hood.” She quipped back.

“I know I need a fucking drink.”

“It’s 10 in the morning, what we need is coffee.”

Did she just say ‘we’?  
He needed to nip that in the bud.  
Queen was known to be overprotective of the ones he loved, and Roy was not about having him wanting to kill him. It was not on his bucket list. Oliver was a grumpy bastard on a good day and he intended to stay somewhat on his good side.

“There is no we.”

“There’s totally a ‘we’. And we need to have a nice long talk about what we just went through.” Thea pulled the car to a stop at a red light, so Roy did the only thing he could come up with at the moment, and jumped out of the car. 

After hailing a cab, he found out that he no longer was in possession of his wallet.  
How had he lost it? It couldn’t have been while he was running. Then he remembered Thea’s hand on him and his mind drew a conclusion he didn’t fully comprehend.  
How the fuck did she manage to pick him, and him not notice?  
Who the fuck was Thea Queen?

That had been nearly a week ago.  
Detective Queen had walked him through what to do when your wallet was stolen as though he was an expert on the matter which caused Roy to wonder what kind of life he had led. There was gossip that the detective’s girlfriend had a habit of stealing his wallet - that it was the way they showed they cared. Roy tried to steer clear of gossip, he kept his head down and worked hard.  
Now he was wondering about the Queen siblings and how much truth was in the gossip.

There was a knock on his door just as he had settled in to his worn couch with his cereal and remote in hand. It was an extremely early hour to have visitors and he was instantly on edge. He placed the cereal and remote on the counter as he grabbed his gun and made his way to the door. Life taught him never to be unprepared.

The knocking had taken on a beat, “Roy Harper, open the damn door.”

He knew that voice. He was not going to answer the door.  
He was going to stay away from the detective’s little sister. And that’s how he was going to think of her in his head. It was the safe way to think about her. Roy was not going to think of little well-to-do Thea Queen smiling with bright eyes driving away from men with guns, because that was an image that fucking got to him on a primal level. It made no sense.  
She stole his wallet, she was Queen’s sister, and she was so far above his station in life that he knew he needed to stay far far away from Thea Queen.

Placing his gun back in its hiding spot he settled himself back on to the couch with his cereal and turned on the TV, bringing up the volume to maximum to drown out the sounds coming from his door.  
There was no one at his door if he couldn’t hear the knocking. He would not go down that rabbit hole.  
No, the universe was not going to pull the rug out from under his feet this time. His life was always just slightly above a disaster and he wouldn’t fall into the chaos that he figured was the norm for the Queen’s.

“It’s rude not to open your door when someone is knocking.”

Fucking hell.  
Roy about jumped out of his skin when he heard Thea’s voice come from behind him, but he didn’t. He kept his cool and managed a bored look as he turned his head to meet her gaze. She was glaring at him holding a tray containing two oversized coffees, her willowy frame was dressed in trendy casual clothes he was certain cost more than his entire wardrobe combined.

“I could arrest you for breaking and entering.”

He wouldn’t though. Oliver would skin him alive for doing so. He also didn’t want to see her in jail.  
She seemed to know that he was all bark and no bite.  
She ruffled him.  
On his best day he wasn’t going to win Mr. Personality and this girl put him on edge. Thea came from the wealthiest family in Star City, she had attended the best schools, had everything she could ever want, and could apparently hotwire cars, pick locks and pockets.  
Where had she even thought to learn those skills?  
Is that what they taught in the fancy schools nowadays? 

“You didn’t open when I knocked, I was in fear for your life, so I let myself in.” It was simple as that in her world. If he had picked a lock to enter someone’s home uninvited he would be arrested or possibly shot; Thea, on the other hand, was making herself at home.

“How did you let yourself in?”

“We all have our own special skills.” She waved off the question and rounded the couch to place the coffees down their feet then sat beside him like it was the most natural think in the world. “I brought you coffee and am ready to hear your apology for blabbing all to Ollie. He gave me a lecture like you wouldn’t believe after you told him I had hotwired his car. He has this way of just talking at you which is super annoying.”

She broke into his house and she was the one expecting an apology?  
What the fuck?  
Thea made no sense to him. She wasn’t what he would have expected and he was stuck half the time with an inflow of mental questions about what the fuck was going on where she was concerned.

“Why are you in my apartment?” He was letting himself get sucked into her madness. He really shouldn’t. No one with half a brain would choose to embrace this kind of madness willingly. He just wanted to keep his head down, work hard and make a difference. What he didn’t want was the temptation of Thea Queen and whatever dangers she brought with her.

“I wanted an apology and I didn’t have your number. I thought about swiping Ollie’s phone for it, but Felicity nixed that idea, so I figured popping by was the best way for us to sort this all out.”

Felicity was Queen’s girlfriend, he knew that much. She was a pretty blonde with a rapid fire speech pattern which was impressive in its own right, the most impressive thing was the way Queen’s face lost some of the darkness whenever she was brought up into conversation or the few times she’d ventured into the station.  
Thea had gone to Felicity with thoughts of swiping his phone. That seemed like an odd thing to talk about with your brother’s girlfriend.

“Are you sane?” 

“Are you?”

He really wasn’t all that sure anymore.  
He wanted her. She was fucking everything he wasn’t and she would never want a guy like him for long. Imagine how those family dinners would go, her bringing home a guy who use to have to steal to survive. Yeah, he wasn’t feeling so sane, because he was finding her crazy endearing and wanted to push her back flat on the couch and press into her soft lean body.

She was Queen’s sister.

Fuck.

“It’s nice to see that you have the comebacks of a kindergartener.” Distance. He needed to distance himself from the weird pull she had on him.  
Was she a witch?  
She could have casted a spell on him. That made as much sense as her breaking into his house.

“Yeah, well, I’m rubber and your glue.” The smile she threw at him threw him off kilter for a moment. Everything he never knew he wanted was in her smile. It was too wide and open for it to be a practiced poised smile, it was real and imperfect and vibrant and held promises and secrets.

He was waxing poetry about the girl who broke into his place and had swiped him wallet.  
Maybe he needed a psych-eval…

“Come on Red Riding Hood, go put on clothes so I don’t have to think about your big bad wolf.”

He was in his boxer briefs.  
Without a shirt.  
And she just gave him that smile (which would be the death of him, because he was thinking he needed to keep doing things to make her smile like that, it wasn’t a sane thought but fuck it) without a hint of blush. Thea was blatantly checking him out and gave no reaction other than her smile. Well, if she wasn’t going to be bothered by his near nakedness, he wasn’t going to be. Besides she’d see him naked at some point.

No. Wrong thought. Bad thought.  
Qliver would kill him and get away with it.  
He wasn’t going to risk his life just to get Thea Queen in bed.

“I don’t think you’re in a position to be giving orders.”

“What position would I need to be in for you to take my orders?” She asked the question so lightly, so innocently, and Roy almost died by choking on a spoonful of cereal.  
She clearly wanted him dead. 

He needed her gone.

“Get out of my place.”

“Not until you apologize. Snitches get stitches and all that shit.”

“Yeah, well, secrets secrets are no fun unless they’re shared with everyone.” He wanted to put his held through a wall and into another dimension the moment the words left his lips. But he wouldn’t react. He knew how to survive. Thea Queen was a predator in disguise. Roy wondered how many times in her life people had underestimated her, because the girl was anything but prey. The way she casually watched him, but tracked every movement with hyper precision, Thea didn’t miss a thing.

Detached. Roy knew how to detach.

“Welcome to the kindergarten class Mr. Harper. You’ll be pleased to know that there is both naps and juice time.”

“Does your brother know you’re here?” 

Thea’s smile instantly became a poised perfect one. It was artificial and sickening.  
He hated it. Hated that he brought it out in her.

“He’s not my keeper and I don’t answer to him.”

“But you care enough of what he thinks to demand an apology from me for telling him about your extracurricular activities?” Roy was playing a dangerous game, backing a predator into a corner. She’d strike and attack. He’d make sure she’d keep her distance.

“It wasn’t your place to say anything.”

“It was part of my job. Sorry Princess, not everyone is going to fall at your feet. Not everyone is going to apologize just because you got a lecture from big brother for playing car thief and fucking up an undercover investigation.”

Something in her eyes changed as he spoke, and he was thinking that it was time he got the hell out of there, even if it was his home.  
Her poised smile fell to slight exasperated look similar to the one that she wore when he had jumped in Oliver’s car and told her to drive. There was no fear, no anger, just a girl who was clearly made of fire; she had the power to burn down cities or light up the dark.  
Why was she not leaving?  
He wasn’t being inviting. He’d had women leave even when he was trying to be nice and yet here Thea Queen was. 

“Does it make you feel better blaming me for your fuck up?” She advanced on him, never leaving the sofa. He kept the detached façade while gracing her with the standard douche predatory smile which nearly revealed all his teeth. He didn’t feel like smiling when she was so close, not when she was a breath away and he could count the faint freckles across her nose or see every color of her irises.  
No he wanted to attack her. Wanted to fight for dominance with her.

She brought out the predator in him that he kept under lock and key.  
He was a protector now, not a predator.  
Trying to keep his body in check, he narrowed his eyes, a bored expression coming over his features.

“Go home Thea, you’re out of your league. Stop playing with things you don’t understand.” Roy fought hard to keep his voice devoid. He deserved a medal for accomplishing that, seeing as one of her hands had found purchase on his thigh and the other was resting idly on his abdomen. She gave him that perfectly poised smile, that Roy was quickly starting to hate, and pushed her short nails into his skin.

The bite of her nails and her nearness caused heat to sear through him; Thea didn’t know how dangerous he could be. She looked at him with that mixture of predator and prey and he knew she was calculating her attack, that’s when her smile shifted to a deadly one and he had to fight from showing any emotion – though certain parts of his anatomy hadn’t gotten the memo.

“You don’t even know what league I’m in.” Her words were husky and he knew she was playing him.

“Princess, you just want an adrenaline rush. We’ll go ride some roller-coasters to get it out of your system.”

“This your way of asking me on a date?”

Thea was too close. He needed distance.

“This is my way of making sure you don’t endanger yourself or anyone else.” As he spoke he pushed himself up off the couch and away from her touch. Everything about her was a contradiction. She was intrigue to say the least and he wanted her body on a primal level. Thea Queen would be dangerous to his health mainly because Oliver Queen would kill him.

“Killjoy.” She flopped back on to the couch, “You don’t play off douche as well as you think FYI. You might be an asshole, hardened from street life and all that jazz, but you’re not a grade-A-douche. Something to work on if you plan on keeping up with the whole undercover thing.”

He raised an eyebrow at her and she responded a delicate shrug of her shoulder, “You lead the life I have, you learn how to read people. Someone’s always trying to con the little rich girl.”

Fuck, he liked her.  
He was still pretty certain that she was half insane, but that didn’t seem to matter all that much.  
He wanted to know her.

“Did you bring my wallet?”

This was the sort of question he should be asking. This might get him out of having to go to the DMV to get a new ID. His cards were in the mail and he’d already cancelled the others, but he really didn’t want to have to go to the DMV.

“If I say yes that admits guilt.”

It was clear that he wasn’t going to arrest her. So he in turn gave her a rather bored expression.  
Grabbing a coffee she pushed herself up to her feet and took a sip while her free hand when to the back pocket of her jeans and she produced his wallet.

“I found it in the car after you decided to run away. Figured I’d be super nice and deliver it to you in person - mainly because you had an excellent driver license picture. Major kudos for pulling that off.” 

And just like that she handed him back his wallet, which looked completely untouched, and was gathering up her things. Like she was going to leave.  
He didn’t want her to leave.

No, No, he did want her to leave. He wanted distance.  
Thea Queen would not be good for his health.  
It was something he needed to remind himself. He needed to remember who her family was and that she came from everything he didn’t. They needed to go their own ways.

Roy wanted to say something nice to her, “Thanks.”  
He really wasn’t an all-star at the communicating thing.

“Any time,” she gave him that smile, and he didn’t know exactly what her any time meant. It covered a wide variety of things that he really didn’t want to touch with a ten-foot pole, but it didn’t mean he was going to keep that sort of distance from her at that moment. In this room. His small cramped living room.

Thea brushed past him, he kept his body rigid as he felt her heat against his skin.  
This would be the last time he would probably see her, it was a sobering thought.

“And Roy?” She had the front door propped open, “You might want to invest in new locks. You don’t want just anyone who can pick a lock to be able to just let themselves in. See you around.”

Then she was gone with a teasing smile and Roy knew. Fuck, he knew that he was going to be pulled into the chaos of Thea Queen.  
Oliver was going to shoot him. And that thought made him smile. What the fuck?

What the hell was the universe planning this time?

**Author's Note:**

> Alrighty...so, I know, I know. It's an odd addition to the Swoonerverse, but it needed to be done. Like it was in my head, and I was like yeah, let's write it.  
> I love the badass, spunky, adrenaline junky that Thea can be. She's such a complex character. And Roy is grumpy a bit rough, wants to just do good and make the world better, but he's sarcastic and fluffy.  
> As most of you know if you've read any of the other Swooner works...I tend to stick to Felicity's point of view, and well, she's spastic and has lived in this weird chaos her entire life. So, for this I wanted a 'normal' pulled into the crazy.  
> I did. I really did.  
> Roy didn't want the crazy. he didn't. But he can't help it. Thea is awesome and he got pulled in.
> 
> More may come from this...  
> I think I might like them. But it'll be marked as complete for now :)
> 
> Thank you to everyone who reads and puts up with me! You all are fabulous. And I love all my Swooners!  
> <3
> 
> I hope I have not failed this 'verse!


End file.
